Clippers complete season sweep of Rockets

Share this:

Obvious as the void had been, was sure to be and likely will remain with the Rockets’ starting center and point guard out, it was never more obvious than when the Los Angeles Clippers made their move.

The Rockets led by 15, moving the ball and scoring rapidly through the first 14 minutes Saturday night at Toyota Center. Then Chris Paul took over until that Rockets’ fast start fell off a cliff, leaving two cartoon-style craters at the bottom shaped tellingly like Dwight Howard and Pat Beverley.

The Rockets showed they could have made up for the absences of Beverley and Howard. But once the Clippers got going, finishing their four-game season sweep of the Rockets with a 118-107 roll in which they scored so easily Rockets coach Kevin McHale resorted to intentionally fouling DeAndre Jordan hack-a-Dwight style, the absence of two of the Rockets’ best defensive players was glaring.

Nearly as glaring, the Rockets’ offense seemed out of kilter, with the ball movement and spacing that fueled their five-game winning streak and 11-game run in Toyota Center bogging down badly.

“After the first quarter, we kind of struggled moving the ball,” McHale said after the Rockets collected 10 assists in the first 14 minutes, then just four thereafter. “We didn’t have good ball movement. We didn’t have good body movement. We couldn’t sustain anything offensively. They switched, and we didn’t do what we had done earlier, which was attacking with the ball, and we got really stagnant.

“That’s as bad as we’ve been, stagnant-wise and ball movement-wise, in a long time.”

Though Clippers star Blake Griffin left the game after just six minutes with back spasms, Terrence Jones made just one field goal, for two points.

More conspicuously, Jeremy Lin’s first game back in the starting lineup did little to ease concerns about Beverley’s absence. Lin made just 1 of 9 shots and had just two assists in 32 minutes, often seeming out of place on the perimeter as the Rockets bunched around the ball like a youth soccer team.

Lin ‘didn’t do much’

“I was pretty frustrated,” Lin said. “I didn’t play well at all. It’s not the best feeling to know that in such a big game with so much responsibility, I didn’t do what the team needed me to. That’s on me. I didn’t do much of anything tonight.”

Lin has enough history as a scorer for the Rockets to believe he will come around on that end. But defensively, McHale did not attempt to have Lin match up with Paul. With the option to put Lin on Darren Collison, McHale put Chandler Parsons on Paul, and rarely was Beverley’s absence felt more.

When the Rockets held their 15-point second-quarter lead, Paul rolled to 17 second-quarter points, on his way to 30 on 10-of-16 shooting with 12 assists.

“He did everything,” McHale said. “He just went wherever he wanted with the ball.”

Parsons on Paul

Parsons often could stay in front of Paul. He nearly matched his production, scoring 28 points, his most since Jan. 24, with nine rebounds. But matched up with Paul, he could not begin to be as disruptive as Beverley has been, as the Clippers ran their offense easily to open shots.

“It’s tough,” Parsons said. “I’m 6-9, 6-10. I just try to use my length. He’d hit 3s if I go under (screens). When I chased him over the top, he’d get in the lane and get past the bigs. That’s why he’s Chris Paul.”

He does those things often, but once the Clippers got going, the Rockets did not make anything difficult and did not have the offense to make up for it.

With the Rockets’ upcoming schedule filled with strong point guards, the Rockets likely will go back to having Lin defending opposing point guards.

That can work. The Rockets are 13-7 with him starting at the point this season. But despite the fast, encouraging start, in their first game without Howard and Beverley, they were missed even more than the Rockets expected.

Next man up?

“You can’t use that as an excuse,” Parsons said. “Everybody goes through injuries. They didn’t have their best player, either. It’s part of it. We have to learn to win games without guys and hope they can get back as soon as possible.”